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My hands hurt.
This contract ends next week so I’ll be back to a normal schedule.
hugs for everyone
—
I managed to read the Grenade thread (and its offspring) but was almost always too late to comment.
(and usually asleep by 8 PM)
Well done, Horde.

I think that I’m going to try to find a bedframe to which I can attach a headboard…the idea of hitting a wire back there kind of makes me scared.

Good idea, Portia. Besides, it’d be a shame to disturb that old plaster. Hanging there for as long as it has and all. I’m sure you’ll be happy with the results. We can haz foto?
Oh, and sorry about the blubers. You should try again.

Crudely, I’m very glad that Wrottland is a happy place. You deserve some happy.

Cicely, thank you for the kind sentiment. I heartily agree with it! =)

Careful, FossilFishy. Tony’s been on fire lately. Hate to see anything happen to you beard.

Sympathies for Mellow Monkey and niece. If only a prayer would work . . .

I will provide photographic evidence if and when I get the project done :)

—

Went and had a beer (a single beer) with a friend at a bar down the block. My (fairly harmless, so far) drunken neighbor was there, who is always at a bar in town and never sees me because I am never at the bar. He said, from down the bar, “Hey, Carrie,what are you doing here?!” I said “Same thing you are, presumably.” Three people laughed and said “You’re not a lawyer are you? ‘Presumably’?” I need to do better switching back to colloquialese after work, ha.

Thanks for the sympathy, everyone. I always feel bad bringing negative life stuff into the Lounge, but I just feel so panicky over this. She had a fever earlier, too. When she saw her doctor yesterday, she (the doctor) didn’t seem especially concerned about her recovery. It just got worse tonight.

Oh he can try Crudley, he can try. But I’m all aready for this here tussle. My nits are all lined up and ready for the ‘picken.*

You mentioned a while back your admiration for the craftsmanship (Is there a gender neutral for that term?) in old houses. Clearly you never tried to renovate my former girlfriend’s house. It was built in 1901 by what we later found out was a newspaper reporter. He clearly wasn’t any sort of carpenter. Nothing, and I mean nothing was square, true, plumb or on center. We pulled off the old lathe and plaster to insulate the walls and Every. Fucking. Sheet. of drywall needed to be cut lengthwise or a new stud had to be put in in order to fix the edges. It was nightmare from start to finish, including taking down a ceiling light to discover that the person she’d hired to pull all the cloth covered wiring gave up 3/4 of the way through and didn’t tell her.

*Actual I really like Buffy, but any show that runs that long will have problematic bits.

Eliza Dushku can out act any dumb Doctor Who goober.
She played Buffy to a T when they swapped bodies. Faith had more personality than Buffy and more nuance.

Shame rq ain’t here to watch me win at Pictionary against Portia and Pinky Fights with FossilFishy.
Oh, and I didnt forget cicely over there. When I finish with the two of them, you and I are
G
O
I
N
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I always feel bad bringing negative life stuff into the Lounge, but I just feel so panicky over this.

Don’t ever feel bad on that account. For Odin’s sake, people come here to whine about a broken shoelace! I think a loved one in a bad physical and emotional situation counts a bit more than that, right? You can’t help support her if you don’t have support yourself. Speaking of support, you have all of mine, always.

No, but I’ve worked on a few just like it. Old foundations settle and some “builders” just have their own ideas about what is needed and what is “good enough”. I assume you ended up getting the job done. Or close enough?

Oh yes Mellow Monkey I’m going to back Portia here. Community isn’t just about common interests, it isn’t just about sharing the positives, it’s also about supporting those in need.

I’m going to rip off Spider Robinson here and say that one of the fundamental aspects of us social animals is that shared joys are increased and shared pains are decreased. We’re stronger for that sharing, *all* of us are stronger for that sharing, be it the one who is talking or those who are listening.

Your troubles are no burden to be unloaded upon us, never that, they are an opportunity. They’re way in which we can make this world a better place in a small yet unequivocally real way. If you wish to share I would be honoured, and mean that quite literally, to listen.

I just turned down an invitation to a music festival from a friend because I feel like he’s getting the wrong idea (several years ago, before our currently renewed friendship, he got the wrong idea, and took the rejection well). I might be wrong about his ideas, but I don’t want to take a chance. I wish I didn’t worry about it, because he just moved here and knows almost no one and I would really like to have a regular-hang-out friend and also keep him from being bored to tears in this tiny town. Oh well. C’est la vie.

I’m going to rip off Spider Robinson here and say that one of the fundamental aspects of us social animals is that shared joys are increased and shared pains are decreased. We’re stronger for that sharing, *all* of us are stronger for that sharing, be it the one who is talking or those who are listening.

Beautifully said. This is what I tell my friends, because I really do feel honored when someone confides in me or leans on me.

wow, just wow completely out of touch due to heavy work schedule until a friend alerted me to the after effects of the grenade post. Thank you Caine, and all of the others who stepped up. Home from Fargo but working on the same stuff, lots of hours but at least I am home.

I much preferred her in Dollhouse. I think she was more …tempered in that character. But even so, I also had this nagging dissatisfaction with her persona, and I can’t put my finger on it in that show. In Buffy, I am certain. It’s the overacting.

Hey, Broboxley, good to see you. For every thread rotten with apologists, there was a mass effort, and it was a thing of beauty, full of shiny people everywhere, raising their axes as one. Hell of a thing, I gotta say.

Oh very much a close enough sorta situation. I’m no carpenter either, it was strictly a case of learning as I went. We’d finish one ‘room’* and look back at the job we’d done on the previous one and go “Fuck, I could do that way better now.” It was interesting, frustrating and educational all at the same time. And it produced one of my favorite pics of me. She always seemed to have money for this stuff in winter, Canadian prairies winter. That pic is of me, Sawzall over my shoulder, grinning, standing in the gap in her front wall where the new window was to go as the snow blew into her lounge room.

*Scare quotes because she told the tax folk that it was 450 square feet, and she lied about it. It was actually smaller than that.

I’m going to rip off Spider Robinson here and say that one of the fundamental aspects of us social animals is that shared joys are increased and shared pains are decreased. We’re stronger for that sharing, *all* of us are stronger for that sharing, be it the one who is talking or those who are listening.

Portia, is there any way you could clearly, but tactfully, clue your friend that you continue to want to just be friends?
–

She’s a fine actor, however, I don’t much like her. I don’t know why, just one of those things.

Yes. Nothing concrete, just….
–broboxley!*boozes*
–

They do, with great gusto, and no, I didn’t eat any rats! Writing skillz, I haz them not.

It’s the grenade-shock.
To which you are totally entitled.
–Hush is probably my third favorite.
–
Remind me to tell y’all the Story of the Incredibly-Inept Plumbing, sometime.
Not right now. cicely go sleepy-time, now.
‘Night, everyone.
-

Oh Tony, I have to say that I was never convinced by the Faith character. I don’t know if it was overacting or what, but every time she was on screen it broke my suspension of disbelief. I always felt like I was watching an actor work rather than being a fly on the wall to a real experience. But the subjective is subjective and I’m glad you got pleasure from her performance.

Heya, Tony The Queer Shoop @464 – Sorry, just got back on the computer (family of four, one PC), so I’m way behind.

Anyway, yes, it’s fun watching someone discover BtVS for the first time – we talked our younger daughter into watching last year, although she gave up partway through S5. She likes Fringe and Dr Who better. Not that I can blame her – Fringe was outstanding.

Off the top of my head, some of my favorite episodes from before where Portia says she’s at would be – The pilot (The Harvest, I think – I imprinted on Giles immediately), pretty much all of Season 3, the Thanksgiving episode, the last episode of S4, Hush, Buffy vs Dracula… I’m sure I could think of others, but not just at the moment.

Yes, the last episode of S4 (can’t remember the title just now) is fascinating, and I really like the one before that, where Giles and the Scoobies become a Slayer gestalt to defeat the Big Bad.

Weird question: For months, I have had a stabbing, recurring (obviously), sharp pain in the center of the back of my right thigh. I think my internist (when I had one) waved it off as referred pain. It has appeared tonight and last night, after I have been laying down for a while. Does anyone have ideas? It’s so sharp when it happens that I invariably physically wince.

rq – I’ve been meaning to respond to your message in the last thread, but it was about the last thing I had time to read before life outside of Pharyngula got really busy for me, and I never got the chance. I gladly accept your *hugs* and hope you are feeling much better by now so that neither of us needs to worry about the transfer of germs. :D

As you can probably guess, I’m thoroughly threadrupt, so I’ll just leave this pile of *hugs and chocolate* so that they’re available for everyone, and I’ll start getting caught up on the most recent comments. (I know I’ll never have time to read them all.)

From the site:
Identification —
May be brown, black or brightly colored. Short three-segmented beak used for stabbing prey. Beak folds into groove in prosternum. Head typically constricted behind the eyes, giving a neck-like appearance. Antennae long, thin, not clubbed. Forelegs sometimes swollen or expanded for catching prey.

Food —
Most prey on arthropods; Triatominae suck blood.

Life cycle —
Incomplete metamorphosis: eggs hatch into tiny nymphs which molt several times as they grow to adulthood.

Remarks —
Many species can inflict a painful bite on humans if handled, so it’s wise to avoid touching them. If one lands or is seen on your body, brush it or flick it off with a sideways motion. Do not slap or swat it because it will almost certainly bite if you try to crush it.

Numbers —
184 spp. in 49 genera north of Mexico(3); second largest heteropteran family, with close to 7,000 spp. in almost 1,000 genera worldwide(4), arranged in 25 subfamilies; world taxa cataloged on(5)

When it lit on my arm I had an inkling of what it was but wasn’t sure. I took it gently by its hindmost parts and brought it inside and placed it in a clear, plastic container. I keep several handy, you know.
Upon examination through a hand lens I saw its jointed beak and said to myself, “Aha! Assassin Bug! Cool.
A few minutes ago I captured a large crane fly (http://bugguide.net/index.php?q=search&keys=crane+fly&search=Search), which was somewhat the worse for wear due to the capture, and put it in with the Z. luridus and commence to watch.
Z. luridus assumed an alert pose and approached in a stealthy manner. Closer and closer, it stalked the crane fly. Suddenly the crane fly spasmed and two of its incredibly long, thin legs entangled Z. lurids. Z. lurids struggled to withdraw and only through great effort untangled itself, pulling off one of crane fly’s longer legs in the process. It then retreated, the disembodied leg still tangled on a shoulder spike and twitching grotesquely. It has since shown no interest in the free meal I so thoughtfully provided.
So, I come away with this. A grusome predator named Luridus, know to fearlessly bite humans, with a relative that sucks blood and infamous in the world of arthropods falls fairly to hand and, upon capture, becomes cautious and seemingly loses its apatite. Passing strange. Maybe it’s a cowardly assassin bug. I feel a tad let down.

Still, I can’t help but think that Z. luridus might fit nicely into an episode of Buffy. Are they still being produced? Pity if not. I’d really like to see the molting bit.

I love this stuff and you know what? I’m holding out. Yes, I’m gonna hold out. I’m not taking that long sleep until someone calls home from Mars. I’ve been waiting all my life and I ain’t goin’ nowhere till someone calls home. From Mars.
____________

Now I lay me down to sleep
And dreaming utter not a peep.
Silently I’ll listen
And noiselessly I’ll zoom,
Exploring and remembering
This grand, expanding room.
Through ethers distant I will roam
Please, ‘ere I die, someone! Call home!

My niece had a miscarriage last week–or is it considered a stillbirth at twenty weeks?–and is still bleeding. Tonight she threw up and then when she laid down, she started having shooting pains.

Assuming that this was a wanted pregnancy, I’m so sorry for your niece’s loss.I’m so sorry for the loss of a wanted little one for you. A second trimester loss is quite serious indeed. As someone who has experienced a later loss, I’d say, be sure to reassure her that she did nothing wrong. That prayers did not desert her. (In that the loss was some result of lack of prayer). Remind her that science is imperfect, and we are working on it all of the time. That we strive to prevent such loss. Gosh. I probably shouldn’t comment on this one other than to offer condolences. My thoughts are with you.

Portia, a referred pain is not to be handwaved. Frinst., sharp, nasty pains in between the should blades is a referred pain from the pancreas (learned that one first hand.) Get another opinion, because if it is a referred pain, that means something is going on elsewhere in the bod and you need to know what.

Nice site bluentx. I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned it when you’ve been around but I managed a used books tor for almost 20 years. I found lots and lots of things in books. Truth be told I never paid much attention to the ones that were just book marks. But you’d be surprised at the number of love letters and nekid pictures* that get hidden in books and then forgotten. Not much cash though. I think over the whole time it amounted to less than a hundred dollars.

At one point the staff were pinning things they found to a cork board in a semi-public place in the store. I had to put a stop to it because some of the stuff was personal and perhaps identifiable. My attempt to explain why, “How would you feel if you saw a love letter you wrote pinned up for all to see?” fell on deaf ears. I ended up just having to pull a ‘because I said so.’

*Most weren’t anything too out there. Although one still puzzles me. It was obviously taken in a motel and showed a naked woman holding a volley ball, from her expression she was having a good time. What the hell was the volley ball about?

The most moving thing I found was a letter from a soldier who was in training before being shipped to France in WWI. It was tucked in the back of a bible and I suspect that he never came back. I couldn’t find out anything about him though because the signature was unreadable.

blf & justatheory – thank you for the suggestions to my menu. Along with the lightly killed baby toads and spotted dicks I plan to serve devil sauce, pickled bloaters, neck pudding, and stuffed teddy bears.
After the spankings we shall have Singin’ Hinnies*

FossilFishy
I do remember you mentioning the bookstore. I haven’t found anything really interesting* as a bookmark but the inscriptions can be a hoot!
I did find some historical gems (censored letters from my uncles to my mom during WWII), mementos (passes allowing us to return to our house after hurricanes in Louisiana) and awful reminders (blatantly racist letters to voters from the local political boss– on official letterhead no less!) when going through my parents things after they died. The things you learn about your family as ‘executor of the estate’.
—
* I guess that’s cause folks like you take out the nekid pictures, darn it!

Sometimes pushing with my hand on the affected area does help a little, so maybe I’ll give it a bigger effort next time. Thanks for the input.

Caine:

I never thought of it like that, partly because this was the first doctor who ever told me that, and she was very unconcerned about it. She also handwaved a recurring pain in the area of the pressure point behind my jaw under my ear. Made it sound like there was no way to know where the pain was referred from.

I might have health insurance soon, and I’ll try to get a better doctor if I do.

I used the American Atheists Contact Us form to complain and got this response a few minutes later:
Kelly,

Thank you for your message. Our president happens to be on vacation this week and is out of the office, but I’m SURE he didn’t watch the video past the credits before tweeting that—I didn’t do so myself until someone pointed it out to me. I have never known him to victim-blame or perpetuate rape culture in any way, shape, or form. In fact one of the reasons I wanted to work for American Atheists in the first place (I started here about six months ago) is that American Atheists was the first of all the atheist orgs to enact a harassment policy at their conventions and events following Rebecca Watson’s talk about her experience on the elevator at the conference in Ireland three years ago. Every single one of us on staff identifies as a feminist and although I can’t speak for him directly, I’m certain it wasn’t intentional. Thank you again for telling us about your concerns.

That’s pretty encouraging. Add me to the list of people who didn’t finish the video til I was tipped off, so it’s a totally credible explanation to me. Here’s hoping the man himself addresses it when he’s back from vacation.

And specifically thank you, yazikus @549. I’ve never been pregnant or even had a relationship that could lead to a pregnancy without outside assistance, so this is all very foreign to me. Words of experience help me a lot in being more supportive.

They gave my niece a D&C, but they were having such a difficult time with pain management that they had to sedate her and she was kept overnight. Her fiance is going to get her this morning, having brought their 15mo daughter home at around 1am to try to get her to sleep. She didn’t all night, but zonked out once he stuck her in the car to head back to the hospital. I can’t even imagine how exhausted he has to be.

This was a wanted pregnancy though it had happened earlier than they were planning, but it’s doubly sad because it’s doubtful that they’ll ever have any more. Her fiance has a serious heart/skeletal condition that is dominant inherited. The two had doubted this was truly going to be passed onto their children (even after speaking with doctors and a genetic counselor) because the fiance has five siblings and none of them have it and his mother insists that the doctors are wrong. (Stupid magical thinking woman and poor hopeful young people listening to her.) Well, spontaneous mutations occur and that’s what happened in his case. They won the 50/50 coin toss with their first daughter, but this fetus was delivered with what was clearly the same condition the father had, except far more severe. They’ve decided that it’s not worth the risk and the tax on my niece’s body to try again. They know there are other options for the future (AI, adopting, IVF with genetic screening), but right now they’re poor and sad and scared.

So this is a lot to mourn for them right now and my heart breaks for them. I’m just glad we’re mourning hypothetical children and not the loss of my niece.

Ooooh, religious people.
I just found out that, more than ten years ago, just after my gran died, a neighbor came to give her condolences to my mother and said that we should not have cremated gran because now her soul can’t get to heaven.

Fucking woman. She fucking dared. And my mom is nice to her, and we go out to pay her bills and buy her bread… and she’s still admonishing us for stuff like “letting dad work in the garden when he’s this sick. what if he dies?”. Well, you think I don’t worry about that every time he’s there? I can’t strap him to a chair and keep him here, now can I?

Well, you think I don’t worry about that every time he’s there? I can’t strap him to a chair and keep him here, now can I?

Having recently recovered from a stroke I can say from experience that people trying to keep one “safe” can be damned irritating and counter productive.

First of all, you can’t keep elderly patients “safe.” You can take reasonable precautions, but limiting their activities too much is also dangerous. Balancing quality of life with safety can be tricky. As far as I can see, too many people urge the elderly to play it safe and their quality of life suffers so much that they wish they were dead, and/or they suffer from depression and other ills associated with inactivity.

We’re all going to fucking die anyway, so don’t fucking tell me I can’t hike on rough ground because I might fall. Yeah, I might. I’m not elderly, but I now know all too intimately some of the indignities forced on them.

The effort of dead-heading her flowers may have been what did my grandma in. But she lived until she died.

My grandpa, on the other hand, refuses to rise to his potential capability, preferring to demand hand/foot waiting, etc.

—

A friend of mine is having a third or fourth surgery on Monday. Her boyfriend is very overprotective about her lifting things or mowing the lawn. I think he thought I’d be on his side when they told me about the fight they had.

You’re right, of course. I should have skipped that last part. Besides, to be honest, it’s for all our benefit that he goes there.
He would be miserable if he had to stop working in the garden. Considering that he’s not a very… nice person, he’d be making mom and me miserable too.

I still worry, though , especially since he refuses to take a mobile with him. Some asshole neighbor making mom and me feel guilty, I could do without.

Sorry if I reminded you of busy-bodies who try to stop you from doing what you like.

We did ask dad to lower his workload in the garden a bit, and he didn’t complain since he realized himself that it was a bit much. If we lived there, it wouldn’t be a problem, but it’s a lot of work just for weekends. It’s been too much for his health for a while there. In fact, when the doctor said that dad had already had one hear attack, dad admitted it happened while he was in the garden, alone.
So we worry. We don’t try to stop him from going.

CN: Suicide
–
Good Morning Horde,
I’d like ideas for a message for a sympathy card I’m going to be sending shortly. The people I’m sending the card to are catholic, and they lost their son to suicide a couple of days ago. Any ideas for a humanist message for them that won’t come off as preachy?
–
This has made me really angry at the catholic teachings on suicide. Absolutely cruel. Wrong. Downright evil.

Since learning from others mistakes, I’m presenting some work I did today…. I’m not happy with it but I also know that I’m hyper critical of my own work. Take a look (I recommend using full screen). Comment, critique, ignore….

yazikus – it doesn’t have to be profound or important. Tell them you hurt for them and with them, tell them how much they mean to you and how much their son meant to you, tell them you’ll stop by with a casserole in a couple of weeks after they’ve had some time.

If they’re not very close to you, you can just say that you’re so sorry they’re going through this, and you’re thinking of them.

skeptianthro -The fact that the tone of voice used for Jack in the rape one didn’t change at all and remained as friendly sounding as in all the other scenarios was a nice touch. I’m not sure of any helpful criticism I could offer, though.

In good news, I finally got through to the unemployment people yesterday, and there is a program I can use. Unfortunately, because private industry is the best and Republicans keep voting, the actual disbursement of the money is via Bank of America, so I won’t see any of it until next week sometime.

Random lighthearted rant: how the hell is it that I’m as old as I am (and that’s pretty darned old) and I still don’t quite understand what color my skin is? Fucking makeup counters with all their “choices”.

And in more joy, L’s new sewing machine (that we borrowed money from a friend for when his last one started breaking down) has started to break down already, impededing and damaging his work, despite the fact that we’ve had the fucker for less than two fucking weeks now.

Portia, pudding? Custard? Lemon meringue cookies? Big, rich, fluffy cakes? I get a ton of eggs from a friends’ farm–they’re currently getting more than they can use or sell–and when I find myself being overwhelmed with eggs, I usually start in on baked goods. They go quickly that way.

Thanks for the great suggestions. I’ve never had Lemon Meringue Cookies but they sound delicious and easy! Now I’d just have to find someone to share them with in meatspace :) I get farm fresh eggs myself, and they’re in my fridge, but I just acquired 2.5 dozen from the leftovers of the fire dept pancake breakfast. Baked goods sounds great.

Just finished reading Maggie Stiefvater’s The Scorpio Races which could resonate with some folks here. It’s YA fiction with a legendary-creature theme, but a welcome break from vampires: on this island are predatory water-horses capall uisce. A few people die quite horribly, but I won’t be spoiling anything if I tell that the protagonist doesn’t die. Whew.

I’ve read all the Stiefvater books I can lay my hands on, loving the way she writes her young female heroes.

Dalillama, Yay! for unemployment program, Boo! for delays and malfunctional sewing machine.
And *hugs* for general stuff and shit.
–Portia, if you blow out the insides (omelet time!—or, many baked goods freeze well; you could be looking at an assured supply of snack-nommables for some time to come) you can do amazing things with the outsides—for instance, pysanky (I’ve done some; it’s fun!), or etched eggs.

“The slayer is a robot! Did anyone else know the slayer is a robot?!”

:) :) :) :) :)
And the look on Glory’s face when she says it!
–

on this island are predatory water-horses capall uisce.

Of course they’re predatory! They’re Horses! And water-Horses are particularly notorious in this regard. Many’s the Player Character been thus hauled off to hir doom (with a certain amount of Kicking and Screaming, of course).
-

Mellow Monkey
My heart goes out to your niece and her family (that means you ;) )
If you want to do something for her, stop the rest of the family from saying stuff like “it was for the best” and such and provide a sympathetic ear for talking. Because quite often women are supposed “to get over it” even before they’ve stopped bleeding.

beatrice

I just found out that, more than ten years ago, just after my gran died, a neighbor came to give her condolences to my mother and said that we should not have cremated gran because now her soul can’t get to heaven.

I’ always amazed that the most omnipotent god can apparently resurrect bodies after thousands of years when all the atoms have spread again evenly, but fails at making instant soup.

carlie
I’m always amazed that “light” skin is often several shades darker than my skin even in summer….

Holiday write-upLocation
The capsite we went to was more or less the only one we could still get a place on, but it was actually better than our usual one. Smaller, less “professional holiday entertainment”, more quiet. Cheaper.

Mosquitos
The fuckers broke all the rules. They were out 24/7, they went through your clothes, they got you on the toilet. I spent about 50 bucks on repellent and then they would get us on the soles of our feet and our fingers.

Kids
The average 4yo asks about 400 questions a day. Because of mine, 4 other kids have to shut up.

Highlights
The Aquarium in La Rochelle. Only that next time we’ll either be there at 7 am or late at night, because I hate standing in line. #1 was totally excited, telling me it was the best trip ever. The little one was overwhelmed, meaning that she told us all the time that she wanted to go home and out and NOT see the sharks. As soon as we were back again she asked us when we were going there again…

Rest
Sun, sea, good food, wine…
My doc is going to kill me. I have a blood test next week. Way more alcohol than usually, more fat than usually and of course iodine…

I stayed up most the night a day or three ago watching re-runs of the The Advengers (and some The New Advengers), and a bit of Dr Who, and am now wondering where my DVD set of The Prisoner has gone to. Will probably have to contact Number 2 and ask for a rover to start searching…

The Time covers are different — but what of the contents? You know, the actual articles…?

● Are they different? (I have no idea.)
● Are they even vaguely interesting? (In my opinion, only rarely.)
● Are they relevant, timely, and — allowing for certain classes of mistakes due to the nature / pressures of current events journalism — correct? (As far as I can now recall, not really, seemingly infused with what I interpret as thug babble.)

I occasionally get Time (European version) when there’s nothing else at the newsstand and the cover is intriguing, but tend to avoid it as I don’t consider it very reliable. I don’t recall buying a single copy this year (so far), hence my caveats above.

My niece is on bedrest for the next week, so it looks like while her fiance is working, I’ll be on toddler duty.

After having done that last week, I’m starting to reconsider the hypotheticals of parenthood. I love my little niece (she’s really a wonderful little person), but…I cannot even fathom doing this every day. For years. This is the most exhausting, frustrating way to spend time, but at least I can help out in this one small way.

Is it completely irresponsible aunthood if I just keep baking cookies and feeding them to the child to keep her sedated on fat and sugar? ;)

Seconded. “Actual chickens” teehehe. Though they’re nasty little uselessly winged jerks…I am not a fan of chickens. Probably childhood trauma from a lily-white rooster named Ricky, who chased us and terrorized even the neighbor’s German Shepherds.

—

cicely:
Those are very cute candles! I might try them.

—

Giliell:
Sounds like vacation w as a success, glad to hear it. I had the same problem with mosquitoes on my camping trip a few weeks ago.

Last week, when a Tennessee judge forcibly changed an infant’s name from Messiah to Martin, it was hard to decide which was more noteworthy, the parents’ grandiosity in naming their child for the one they consider their Savior or the judge’s religious zealotry in prohibiting the name.

“The word ‘Messiah’ is a title, and it’s a title that has only been earned by one person and that one person is Jesus Christ,” said Magistrate Lu Ann Ballew.

What is Judge Ballew going to do about all the Latinos named “Jesus”? Wholesale baby name changes by law?

Separation of church and state? Some people say no. A bunch of clergy are campaigning for the right to endorse candidates from the pulpit. A lot of religious congregations agree with them.

Forty-two percent of black Protestants and 37 percent of white evangelical Protestants say houses of worship should endorse candidates, according to the Pew Research Center. Among Americans overall, that figure has been in the 20s for a decade.

The idea that dragons once walked the earth among humans–or even existed at all–sounds like something from a fairy tale. But Darek Isaacs, a creationist author and filmmaker, is now on record arguing that dragons were real creatures that lived thousands of years ago….

“The Bible speaks about dragons,” Isaacs told the show’s hosts. “Our authority — everything we do, we have to measure by the word of God. That is what I believe. So we have to go to the Bible, and the Bible speaks about dragons.”

Isaacs said that dragons are compared to Satan in the Book of Revelation. And God wouldn’t just throw that in without factual basis, he said.

“If dragons in fact were entirely mythological, if they were a figment of the imagination, and if they never ever did exist, then God just compared our adversary to a make-believe creature that never existed,” Isaacs said….

There’s more here, including a video of Isaacs and a conspiracy theory about translators not giving dragons their due. Ken Ham should add more dragons to his “museum”.

If they want to endorse candidates from the pulpit, I say fine, but pay some damn taxes.

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I heard an argument once that Mormons don’t make charitable donations when they tithe, because it’s quid pro quo: you don’t pay, you don’t get into the temple. Ergo, it’s not a tax deductible donation, it’s a price for a service. Makes sense to me.

I agree with Portia at 632. If preachers want to endorse politicians from the pulpit, let the churches pay taxes. The article referenced earlier also makes the point that endorsing political candidates also affects non-church, that is, secular 501c3 organizations. All of ‘em should pay taxes if they want to endorse candidates.

Crusade for Christ is arguing that the ban on endorsing politicians “ban chills free speech and violates the culture of people who see the weaving of faith and political expression as essential to their religious practice.” Talk about toxic. Religion has its own toxicity rating, but combine religion and politics and Oh Man!

More than 1,100 mostly conservative Christian pastors for the past few springs have been explicitly preaching politics — they call the annual event “Pulpit Freedom Sunday” — in an effort to lure the Internal Revenue Service into a court showdown. Meanwhile, groups that favor a strong church-state separation are going to court to demand that the IRS more aggressively enforce the ban that dates to 1954.

Of course, I see no reason they shouldn’t pay taxes regardless, but that’s a different discussion…

Indeed, I generally argue that they should be held to the exact standards that any other nonprofit is: Money used for charitable work=not taxed Money going anywhere else=taxed the same as anyone else. For cases where, e.g. a food bank is operated out of the church basement, they can work out how much of the church building is used for that, and get that percent break on property tax, for instance. (Note that a food bank not part of a church would still be able to count their entire building in this model). Of course, I also take the tack that if we had decent fucking social infrastructure in this shithole, 80% of nonprofits would vanish overnight; there’s no need for food banks if everyone can afford to eat.

I heard an argument once that Mormons don’t make charitable donations when they tithe, because it’s quid pro quo: you don’t pay, you don’t get into the temple. Ergo, it’s not a tax deductible donation, it’s a price for a service. Makes sense to me.

Yes, that’s a good analysis of mormon tithing. Ex-mormons discuss the conundrum of tithing frequently. The mormon church takes in about $7 billion in tithing per year. They have a top-heavy organization in which many white geezers like Boyd K. Packer pretend to volunteer their services while actually raking in a generous “stipend” and a fuckton of other goodies. They also pay an army of lawyers and real estate specialists to keep their true businesses humming along without IRS interference. They recently built a multi-billion dollar mall in Salt Lake City.

Mormon bishops interview heads of households at least once a year to see if they are “temple worthy,” and the first order of business is assuring that the 10% tithe has been paid. If daddy doesn’t pay his tithe, then his daughter can’t be married in the temple. If she is not married in the temple, then her marriage is “for time only” and not for eternity, not to mention the fact that mormons believe, contrary to statistics, that non-temple marriages will fail more often.

Having one’s bishop take away one’s temple recommend is stressful and negative consequences cover a lot of territory, including perhaps: condemnation from one’s spouse, loss of status in the community, and even closer big-brothering from the mormon hierarchy. If you die while not temple worthy …. well, not even god can help you.
Excerpts from ex-mormons discussing tithing:

So I estimate after adjusting for membership count and inflation, the church has taken in right around 105 Billion in JUST tithing since 1985. That doesn’t include financial holdings, real estate deals, and any other method they use to get filthy rich.

So they’ve only used 1.3% of the tithing collected since 1985 on relief efforts that aren’t designed to assist ONLY other mormons.

So they’ve only used 1.3% of the tithing collected since 1985 on relief efforts that aren’t designed to assist ONLY other mormons.

That’s what really grinds my gears. They claim to be so sooper charitable, but you have to submit to the brainwashing and the culty-creepy stuff to get their help. More quid pro quo that they can use to blinker the moderates who think “churches do good work.” And fuck the people who still do the 17th century crap where you get food or buildings or whatever, but your kids sit through the VBS.

That’s what really grinds my gears. They claim to be so sooper charitable, but you have to submit to the brainwashing and the culty-creepy stuff to get their help.

At the Republican National Convention that capped Mitt Romney’s campaign for the presidency an attempt was made to make the robot-like Romney look human. Couples and individuals who know Romney personally were trotted out to bear their testimony about how the selfless superman had helped them. Every damn one of the Romney-is-a-nice-human witnesses was mormon.

Conclusion: if you are mormon, Romney may help you. Even then, he will do his best to help you without spending any of his or the church’s money.

How do mormons get through their repetitive, ultra boring three-hour Sunday services?

Tyler Woolstenhulme might be loath to admit it but sometimes he’s not paying attention in church. He will happily confess that he’s not the only one.

The 31-year-old Mormon has more than once sat in the pew of his Sandy ward and let his mind wander. When that happens, he pulls out his iPhone 4 and sometimes plays his puzzle game, “1to50.” Or maybe he texts his friends across the aisle….

The thing is, he says, about half the congregation also is on phones and tablets during a sermon.

I visited my local Mormon church at one point and my main impression of the service was… repetition. It’s tedious how everybody gets up and says “I know that Joseph Smith was a prophet. I know the Book of Mormon is true.” Yadda-fucking-yadda.
The scriptural readings are also quite tedious because nobody dares say anything unorthodox or take any kind of critical angle on the text. Only the fact that I was there in an anthropological errand made it bearable. I couldn’t handle that every week.

[A]bout half the congregation also is on phones and tablets during a sermon.

I assume those mobile phones and tablets were purchased at a moronic cult-owned (possibly indirectly) shop, the SIM cards / calls / “Apps” are from companies owned (at least in part, and possibly indirectly) by the moronic cult, manufactured by…, serviced by… etc., etc. In other words, as long as they are tithing the moronic cult, why would the moronic cult’s enforcers care ?

David Cameron [UK’s Grand Vizier] calling for a boycott of ‘vile websites’ that breed cyberbullying is well-intentioned but could prove foolhardy

A second social media related suicide in as many weeks hit the headlines today. Last month, Daniel Perry jumped off the Forth Road bridge, allegedly after being blackmailed on Skype…

When newspapers reported the suicide of Hannah Smith as a result of bullying on ask.fm, David Cameron called for a boycott of “vile websites”. Yet it is unlikely he will do the same with Skype.

Among other things, Skype is owned by a very large corporation who almost certainly tithe the Grand Vizier’s party, if not him personally. And — if the behavior of other large companies is any guide — probably also employ dubious tax-reduction strategies.

The circumstances are of course sadly similar: a young life is cut tragically short because a minority of users are abusing an online platform. …

There is a problem when politicians attempt to pronounce on the workings of the internet; too many of them don’t or won’t get it, probably through a mixture of generational and cultural disconnect. It is a foolish blind spot to cultivate…

But when politicians get the internet wrong, the internet can be ruthless. Sarkozy posts a photo on Facebook claiming to have been at the fall of the Berlin Wall? Mary Macleod claims to have single-handedly ensured a victory for women on banknotes? No, the internet isn’t having that — and so these politicians face the kind of swift justice only the internet can deliver: a ruthless lampooning via the medium of Photoshop. As Sarkozy was muscled into the moon landings, so Mary Macleod found herself celebrated as the architect of the Normandy landings, joining John Terry at the cup final and, in a particularly meta evolution of the mini-meme, taking credit for herself taking credit for banknotes.

Of course, there’s nothing new about satire: it’s as old as politics. But the internet is peculiarly adapted to deftly pricking pomposity. This is partly because nothing dies online…

Perhaps more significant however, is the internet’s sheer speed. A piece of information can travel round the world in the time it takes to hit “post”. When it comes to politicians trying to shape narratives to suit themselves, this speed is disruptive…

This disruptiveness must be scary for a political class used to having it their own way — as the Tories and Lib Dems, who discovered, at a cost of £520,000 this week, that the internet wasn’t down with redefining “government” to mean “party”.

A note of explanation: A wealthy lady died and willed c.0,5M£ to “the government” which was interpreted by the “ruling” coalition parties as meaning them. After this was discovered they returned the stolen funds. (Lib Dems and Tories hand back £520,000 bequest after outcry.) Ironically, the discovery was made by a traditional newspaper, not “the Internet”.

…

[W]hat these stories reveal is that too many of them still don’t understand it. They don’t understand its power, and they don’t understand its limitations. No one would claim that the internet creates democracy, merely that it gives it a super-charged shot of adrenaline. So why think the internet creates misogyny, hatred or, indeed, the sort of toxic bullying we have read about this week? These are the hallmarks of humanity, and if we want to combat them, we need societal solutions. And the sooner politicians wake up to this fact, the sooner we can return to the original purpose of the internet: cat gifs and Sarkozy photoshopped on to the moon.

The opinion piece sadly asserts Vice President Gore did say he invented the Internet (he never did say that, see Snopes). And the writer is conflating “the Internet” with “the Web”. So perhaps writers should also be careful…

I just tried one of my random experiments for dinner: Fresh Gnocchi (made at a local shop), cooked in Miso soup, served with a warm sauce of Gorgonzola, Dijon mustard, egg, and (Arabic) fermented milk.

It actually worked. (Most of the miso cooking liquid / soup is leftover, as anticipated.)

Why? What did they do to you?
Instead of shooting them, I suggest donating them to a worthy cause. Like nailing them to Teh Banananananaman’s (or Ken “Piglet Rapist” Ham’s) feet and filming the action as it rolls off a thousand foot cliff…

I assume those mobile phones and tablets were purchased at a moronic cult-owned (possibly indirectly) shop, the SIM cards / calls / “Apps” are from companies owned (at least in part, and possibly indirectly) by the moronic cult, manufactured by…, serviced by… etc., etc. In other words, as long as they are tithing the moronic cult, why would the moronic cult’s enforcers care ?

Nope. Mostly iPhones and iPads. However, there is an app for Book of Mormon scriptures.

One of the head honchos who sits on the dais every Sunday says he has the app for scriptures on his iPad, but he does not use in church on Sundays. He wants to avoid the “appearance of evil” (same reason Mormons don’t go to Starbucks to buy a cold drink.) He thinks all mormons should leave their electronic devices at the door.

According to LDS-published statistics, the annual number of LDS converts declined from a high of 321,385 in 1996 to 241,239 in 2004. In the 1990s, the church’s growth rate went from 5 percent a year to 3 percent.

By comparison, the Seventh-day Adventist Church reports it has added more than 900,000 adult converts each year since 2000 (an average growth of about 5 percent), bringing the total membership to 14.3 million. The Assemblies of God now claims more than 50 million members worldwide, adding 10,000 new members every day.

“It is a matter of grave concern that the areas with the most rapid numerical membership increase, Latin America and the Philippines, are also the areas with extremely low convert retention,” says Stewart, a California physician. “Many other groups, including the Adventists and Jehovah’s Witnesses, have consistently achieved excellent convert retention rates in those cultures and societies. Latter-day Saints lose 70 to 80 percent of their converts, while Adventists retain 70 to 80 percent of theirs.

And the moronic cult does not own shares in Apple? Certainly possible, possibility even wise; but assuming they don’t, is it due to financial or theononsensical reasons? (I fully realize the finances of the cult are probably Über Top Secret…)

It’s our 35th wedding anniversary tomorrow. So daughter #1 suggested we go to her place for afternoon tea yesterday because she’s busy today, #2 was working on Sat night and they both had to work on Monday. We said yes.

We turned up there yesterday to find streamers, banners, sparkly cards, a lavish spread of food and a mountainous chocolate cake with bigger shards sticking up like chocolate cliffs. And. the. whole. fam. damly. waiting for us. And we never once thought she might do that.

I really do hate to intrude into ongoing and seemingly cheerfull conversation so abrubtly and unvelcome, but I have a rather pressing issue in my mind and this is by far the best place I can find to ask the questions I need to ask before I come to a decision. Which is rather sad in and of itself.

I have a suspicion, that I might have some traits of high functional autism/Aspergers syndrome. I certainly am clumsy in most, if not all, social situations, I prefer to work alone to work in team etc. This, combined with the fact that “my need to pair-bond with a woman conflicts with the apparent collective decision of all womankind to deny me that opportunity”, is causing me severe depressions. And I mean severe, as in I-do-not-want-to-breathe-anymore severe for the last few months. Nothing seems to be causing any pleasure whatsoever and things capable of at least distraction are becomming scarcer every day. And it gets worse with age, contrary to my hopes and expectations, and to popular folk-wisdom. I am still able to wake up in the morning, go to work and do my part without anyone noticing anything, but it gets increasingly more difficult. Has it not been for my parents, whose situation would be much worse of without my rather good income, I probably would not bother anymore since I see no point in sloughing on.

From what I gathered around here, on pharyngula are more people who have similar experiences and/or are similarily “non-neurotypical”. From those I would like to know, if it to their knowledge has at least hypothetical chance to be of any use to get diagnosis to whehter I really have autistic traits, or if at my age (37) I need not bother since it is too late to do anything about it anyway. I would also like to get some info about experience with antidepressives, since I know only two people who took them, and what they told me is not ecouraging at all. They both complained that it severely impaired their intelectual capabilities, and if it is so, then I am better of dead, since my brain is my source of income. Without my intelect, I am even less usefull than I already am.

I am not asking for compassion you are not obliged to grant me, I am not asking for help you cannot provide, I am not asking for resources I do not need, I am asking for information you migh have and I lack.